When my Mother-in-Law became my Mother

We, humans, are tied in various relationships. Some relations are given to us by God, some are chosen by us and some are by destiny. Some relations which we think are not working, we break up, but some relations are those, by being in it we feel uncomfortable; still, we have to bear those. Out of various relations, one relation is the relation between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law. I think this is the second most important relation after the one between husband and wife, in the house of in-laws.

Like other girls, I also used to think about how my husband would be? How my in-laws would be? As I had heard many bad experiences of the mother- in-law and daughter in-law so I was quite sure to get such a mother -in-law. I had never heard a single experience of a good relationship between a mother-in-law and daughter -in-law. At the time of marriage, I had made an image of mother- in-law that somehow resembled Hitler.

As days were passing, I was trying to adjust in my new home. Everyone was fine and the bond which I was sharing with everyone was getting stronger. Still, it somewhere lacked with my mother- in-law. Although she was nice and she never treated me ill but I was not able to convince myself about her. She had never let me do the household work alone. She never let me eat food alone. She always ate with me. She never objected to me to do anything, but still, I was not able to trust her completely.

But one day something happened that changed my perspective towards her. One day I got heat stroke. There was no one with me, except my mother- in-law. I took the medicines and was resting. There is a home remedy for heat stroke that if we apply raw onion paste on the palm and sole then it helps a lot. So my mother- in-law made that and brought that to me. She applied that paste on my palm. When she was going to apply that on my sole, I stopped her.

“Mummy, what are you doing? You cannot do this.” I said

“Why?” She said.

I said – “You can’t touch my feet.”

“You are ill and I am applying the paste on your feet, what is wrong in that?” She said.

“But Mummy I can’t let you to this.” I said.

“Why not?” – She said

Then she said if your mother can apply this on your sole then I can do this as well. You are like my daughter, and I also want you to treat me like your mother.

I was shocked after listening to this. I was full of tears because of joy. That day I realized that every mother- in-law is not like the Hitler. It all depends on person to person. All relationships are balanced by both the persons. It takes two to make a clap. For a smooth relationship, only one thing is required that is the efforts from both sides. It is not that my relationship with my mother- in-law is always good. Sometimes she gets angry on me and sometimes I get angry with her but there is one thing common that we never hesitate to say sorry to each other. I thank the God that he had given me two mothers.

The relation of a mother -in-law and daughter in-law is never appreciated because I think there is a communication gap. If mother-in-law has some problem, she will tell it to her son and same is the case with the daughter-in-law. They never talk directly to each other. This creates misunderstandings. If they talk to each other in a respectful way then things will be easier. A great bond can be shared between them.

About The Author

Tripti Sharma is a freelance digital marketer by profession and blogger by passion. Her areas of interest include philosophy, self-help, spirituality, religion, and God. She is a regular blogger at Speaking Tree. She is an avid reader as well and likes to explore about God. She finds Bhagwad Geeta as source of all the knowledge. She is currently based at Gurgaon, India.